Westside Toastmasters is located in Los Angeles and Santa Monica, California

Get Mileage out of Your Title

Titles lend a professional air and are an opportunity to be more creative. Titles help the audience to focus, make it easier for your introducer, and look better in the program. Many speakers either omit the title altogether or tack on something at the last minute. But the title is the first thing about your speech an audience sees or hears, and it deserves a lot of care. Good speakers use titles as part of their strategy; nothing communicates creativity quicker than a well-worded title. A lively title will also help the meeting planner, who frequently will print them on whatever he or she is using to summarize or sell the meeting. One of my clients actually hired me to help them develop more interesting titles for the annual managers meeting.

A weak title is better than no title at all—barely. Compare "Safety" to "Be Safe and Live Longer: 10 Steps to a Healthy Workplace" and "Managing Well" to "How to Be a Super Boss."

Always use titles—even for a meeting you're running in your own corporation. It's your first chance to catch your audience's attention.